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As the Union of Right Forces (SPS) prepares to hold a conference on Saturday that would see the democratic party be dissolved, a group of St. Petersburg SPS activists is maintaining a campaign against the move. Iosif Skakovsky, a member of the St. Petersburg branch of the Union of Right Forces and a prominent human rights advocate, said that for the party to be reborn, a new concept and a new attitude are needed in order to prevent it from self-destruction. Sunday sees an important meeting of Russia’s liberal forces where a new democratic political party, The Right Cause, is expected to be born that will absorb former members of the Union of Right Forces, the Democratic Party of Russia and Civil Force. |
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 ABOARD THE MOSKVA MISSILE CRUISER — This Russian warship left the shipyard 25 years ago, and it shows: The electronics consoles look like museum exhibits, and its hull carries a thick crust of paint from years of running repairs. |
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MOSCOW — A senior United Russia deputy called Wednesday for a bill extending the presidential term to six years to be fast-tracked through the State Duma, and fellow deputies promised to approve it this week. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who some believe wants to return to the Kremlin, gave his backing to the constitutional amendment Wednesday in his first public comments about the proposal since President Dmitry Medvedev announced it last week. |
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Pirates Foiled MOGADISHU, Somalia — Russian and British forces repelled a pirate attack off Somalia in the first action by a Russian warship sent to bolster international forces fighting a scourge of hijackings in coastal waters vital to global commerce, the two nations’ militaries said Wednesday. |
All photos from issue.
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 MOSCOW — The Moscow City Court on Wednesday ordered senior Federal Drug Control Service officer Alexander Bulbov to remain behind bars for another month on corruption charges in a case widely seen to be linked to a power struggle between feuding clans close to the country’s security services. |
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MOSCOW — A day before a crucial EU-Russia summit in Nice, France, Moscow offered a conciliatory measure on Wednesday by delaying the introduction of higher export tariffs on timber that have been roiling some of its EU neighbors. |
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 City Hall has approved the modernization of Ploshchad Pobedy (Victory Square). Plans for the square, which is dominated by a vast monument commemorating the victims and survivors of WWII and the Siege of Leningrad that was built in the 1970s, include extending the buildings of the Elektrostandard scientific institute located on the east side of the square and the Park Inn hotel located on its west side. |
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Chubais Slams Onexim MOSCOW (Bloomberg) — Billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov’s Onexim Holdings Ltd., the biggest investor in Russian utility TGK-4, “risks losing its reputation” after halting a buyout offer to other shareholders, Anatoly Chubais said. |
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 The world is sinking into a major global slowdown, likely to be the worst in a quarter-century, perhaps since the Great Depression. This crisis was “made in America” in more than one sense. The United States exported its toxic mortgages around the world in the form of asset-backed securities. |
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Russia is a country with large geopolitical ambitions. Both the Kremlin and the general populace dream of having as much influence on global affairs as during the glorious days of the Soviet Union. |
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 Establishing Desert Planet, a 1980s videogames-inspired electronic music band notorious for its homemade spacesuits and green helmets, was a radical move for Finnish musician Jukka Tarkiainen. Tarkiainen, after all, had hitherto been the guitarist with punk and alternative guitar rock band Jalla Jalla, once described as the “Ramones meets Rubettes,” which had enjoyed some cult success in Europe. |
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While worrying rumors keep circulating about local promoters canceling international acts in light of the economic crisis, wonderful things can still happen. |
 This year marks several significant dates in Latin American music. Not only is 2008 the 50th anniversary of Bossa Nova, the jazz samba trend orignated in Brazil by, among others, Antonio Carlos Jobim, it is also the 40th anniversary of “Maria de Buenos Aires,” an operetta based on an Argentine tango by Astor Piazzolla. |
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It’s just what St. Petersburg needs, right? Another throwback eatery celebrating Tsarist-era splendor, a redundant exercise in Imperial kitsch? But the great surprise at Tsar, an excellent new restaurant nestling in the heart of St. |
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JALALABAD, Afghanistan — A suicide attack targeting a coalition convoy in eastern Afghanistan Thursday killed an American soldier and at least 10 civilians, including a 13-year-old child, officials said. At least nine Afghans died at the scene of the blast, near a market in an area often crowded with people, the governor of Batikot district in Nangarhar province told AFP. Another 74 were wounded, some of them critically, and the provincial health director Ajmal Pardais said a 13-year-old child later died in hospital. “A total of 74 people were brought to hospitals. Some of them with superficial wounds were discharged after medical care and some are in critical condition,” Pardais said. |
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 PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Gunmen kidnapped an Iranian diplomat and killed his local guard in northwestern Pakistan Thursday, police said, in the latest of a series of attacks in the region. |
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GAZA CITY — The United Nations will suspend its food distribution to half of Gaza’s 1.5 million people on Thursday after Israel failed to allow emergency supplies into the Palestinian territory, a spokesman said. Israel initially said it would allow 30 trucks to deliver supplies to Gaza on Thursday after it sealed off the Gaza Strip on Nov. |
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 SHANGHAI — Russian Nikolay Davydenko outslugged Argentine Juan Martin Del Potro 6-3 6-2 in a winner-takes-all battle for a place in the semi-final of the Masters Cup on Thursday. The 27-year-old world number five joined Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray in the last four, reaching the knockout stage for the second time in four appearances at the season finale for the top eight players in the world. |
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LONDON — Rafa Benitez insisted his ambitions for Liverpool stretch further than the League Cup after seeing his makeshift side thrashed 4-2 at Tottenham in the fourth round. |
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LONDON — Olympics minister Tessa Jowell has admitted Britain would not have chosen to host the 2012 Games in London if it had known about the economic downturn, according to a newspaper report Thursday. “Had we known what we know now, would we have bid for the Olympics? Almost certainly not,” Jowell told leisure industry bosses at a dinner Monday, the Daily Telegraph reported. |
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MADRID — Real Madrid’s Dutch striker Ruud Van Nistelrooy underwent an operation on his right knee in the United States on Thursday and will miss the rest of the season, according to the Spanish club. |
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Issues Archive